Somehow, Unbelievably

And like a delayed reaction, like stray cancer cells that have taken root, there was a binge.

It was Sunday, more than 48 hours after the ball – and after two days of clean eating. Over the 48 hours I'd had some cravings for various things, including, honestly, a binge. Coming back from a workout in Soho on Saturday morning, I passed a bakery and – not even having seen or smelled any of their goods – had a sudden desire to go in and buy the lot.

I dismissed it as hunger and carried on home for my snack.

Sunday morning, en route to breakfast with a friend, I decided that since normally it takes me 72 hours to detox from a binge, perhaps I might need the same cooling off period from Thursday's messy eating. "If you still want what you want on Monday, you can have it then," I told myself.

Sunday afternoon I thought: "To hell with this. It's the endless delayed gratification that makes me binge in the first place, isn't it?" And so I decided to go to the Magnolia Bakery and buy a slice of cake and have it for my snack. So far, so Normal Person, right?

I should have known this would not go well when I caught myself fibbing slightly about where I needed to turn off from a friend who was heading to the subway. And then quickening my pace. And then getting extremely impatient as the wait seemed interminable. (Thanks to the bizarre hours I tend to hit the place, I've actually never waited in the queue.)

I got my cake. I ate it. It seemed... watered down, somehow. The icing not as thick, the cake insubstantial and tasteless. And yet I kept eating, like if I consumed enough it would stack up into the perfect apex of flavor and texture.

I was supposed hit a spin class at 6.30, two hours away. I had been debating hitting the barre method class just before it. Go, I told myself. Go to class. You can totally do this. One ginormous slice of cake is not a binge, and doesn't have to be.

But already I Could. Not. Stop.

A cannoli cupcake and a cinnamon streusel muffin from another bakery. A few munchkins and the worst blueberry muffin I've ever had in my life (thanks Dunkin Donuts). Cornbread and an apple slice (the baked good, not the fruit) from the Gourmet Garage, where the wry Russian behind the counter watched me grab a cake sample and said; "It's Russian coffee cake. I come all the way from Russia for zis coffee cake we do not have back home." And on it went, seven stops in all.

As embarrassed as I am to admit the seven stops, I am at least as embarrassed to admit that that did not make me full to the brim.

Stop, I kept thinking. Stop now and you can go to spin class.

And at the same time, I was afraid to. I was home, semi-safe, with at least a pause in the bingeing. If I went out again for any reason, I was risking a two-part binge. Already I was thinking about what I would pass on the way home from class.

What if I spent the whole class thinking about what I could eat after?

What if I chased a spin class with, say, a cupcake from the Crumbs bakery across the street?

Just go, I told myself. You'll have to leave the house to get dinner at some point, so you might as well go spin if you possibly can.

And somehow, unbelievably, I did.

I got to spin class and focused on getting through one song at a time.

Somehow, unbelievably, I did.

When it was over I spied a friend and agreed to get dinner with her. We went to a (healthy) place she'd been wanting to try, and when we arrived, that's when the fullness hit me. I felt too sick to eat anything, so I sat while she ate. After a couple of hours, I suddenly decided I wanted to eat, but the kitchen had closed.

When we parted ways, I stood on the street corner, wavering. I wanted rice, among other things. Should I order? Where could I go?

Home, I thought. You can go home and not buy anything you shouldn't.

I went home and had cereal for dinner (something I do more often than I'd like to admit). I debated chasing it with various other things, and then thought, sharply, that is enough. Go to bed.

Somehow, unbelievably, I did.

This morning I had agreed to meet a PR at a new boxing class. (I know I could cancel, but I really do not want to get into the pattern of thinking commitments are elastic when I binge.)

I joked to the boxing instructor that I might not be able to jump rope because I'd taken down an entire cake (little did he know...). He answered: "Oh, don't worry. I took down a chandelier once."

I envied how oblivious he was to what I meant. I wish I were.